er lap the head of the miserable
sufferer. This account was drawn up by Mrs. Elizabeth Willoughby, a
Catholic lady, who, amidst the horrid execution, could still her own
feelings in the attempt to soften those of the victim: she was a
heroine, with a tender heart.

The subject was one of the executed Jesuits, Hugh Green, who often went
by the name of Ferdinand Brooks, according to the custom of these
people, who disguised themselves by double names: he suffered in 1642;
and this narrative is taken from the curious and scarce folios of Dodd,
a Roman Catholic Church History of England.

"The hangman, either through unskilfulness, or for want of sufficient
presence of mind, had so ill-performed his first duty of hanging him,
that when he was cut down he was perfectly sensible, and able to sit
upright upon the ground, viewing the crowd that stood about him. The
person who undertook to quarter him was one Barefoot, a barber, who,
being very timorous when he found he was to attack a living man, it was
near half an hour before the sufferer was rendered entirely insensible
of pain. The mob pulled at the rope, and threw the Jesuit on his back.
Then the barber immediately fell to work, ripped up his belly, and laid
the flaps of skin on both sides; the poor gentleman being so present to
himself as to make the sign of the cross with one hand. During this
operation, Mrs. Elizabeth Willoughby (the writer of this) kneeled at the
Jesuit's head, and held it fast beneath her hands. His face was covered
with a thick sweat; the blood issued from his mouth, ears, and eyes, and
his forehead burnt with so much heat, that she assures us she could
scarce endure her hand upon it. The barber was still under a great
consternation."--But I stop my pen amidst these circumstantial horrors.]

[Footnote 79: Harl. MSS. 36. 50.]

[Footnote 80: This pathetic poem has been printed in one of the old
editions of Sir Walter Rawleigh's Poems, but could never have been
written by him. In those times the collectors of the works of a
celebrated writer would insert any fugitive pieces of merit, and pass
them under a name which was certain of securing the reader's favour. The
entire poem in every line echoes the feelings of Chidiock Titchbourne,
who perished with all the blossoms of life and genius about him in the
May time of his existence.]

[Footnote 81: Foreign authors who had an intercourse with the English
court seem to have been better informed, or at l